Like a Friend
by Astrid
Summary: Pre-RENT fic. Roger is off drugs and under the close supervision of Mark. What happened to them during those six months? PG-13 for language and whatnot.


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A/N: _Okay, characters aren't mine. Ummm, neither is the title. The title is the name of a Pulp song (which I recommend that you all go out and listen to right now) and the characters are Jonathan Larson's. Just the idea is mine. Much gratitude goes to Leah for giving me all the little references in this fic. God knows I can't think of that crap on my own. _

I haven't exactly been sleeping well lately.

Not like I sleep much in the first place, but I usually catch an hour or two here and there. Not now. Not ever since that day that Roger and I raided his room and tossed out everything he had in there that remotely looked like a drug. I haven't slept in 72 hours and it's starting to catch up with me.

I'm curled up on the couch flipping through the channels, the light of the TV casting a blueish moon-like glow around the otherwise dark room when it starts. The pacing. I don't know if he was sleeping and he woke up, or if he just never went to sleep. He just disappeared into his room around 8:00 and stayed there, and I knew that he would be safe. His room was clean of anything that could be dangerous, and I haven't taken my eyes off of him or let him out of the house since this all started.

His footsteps are loud and heavy and I've got them memorized. Four slow steps one way and three quick ones back. I turn the television down and perk my ears. Just listening for now. He paces and lets out a few grunts here and there. I can't do anything but sigh. Withdrawal is hell for him and I know that. It's hell for me too. I've got to watch him go through this. Hopefully we'll make it through tonight without an episode.

I speak too soon. The door to his room flies open and he storms out, soaked in sweat, his pajamas crooked and wrinkled, and his bleached hair matted to his head abnormally. I look up from my spot on the couch as he starts pacing the kitchen, looking for something, I assume. I inhale and speak up carefully. I know that the littlest thing can set him on a tirade, and I just don't have the patience for it tonight.

"Hungry?" I ask him slowly and quietly, my voice sounding odd and groggy. I look at the clock. 11:00 on the dot.

"Nope..." He replies simply, his voice stranger than my own. That deep baritone has been reduced to a nervous shudder of sound. I almost don't want to listen to it sometimes. I decide to persist.

"Maybe you should try eating something...Collins said that your appetite would be gone but that you need to keep something on your stomach in case you..."

"I'm not fucking eating, Mark."

Fair enough. 

I sigh and turn back to the TV, pretending to be interested in whatever the woman in spandex and too much makeup is trying to sell me, but my eyes keep wandering back to him, noticing the little things. The way his hands shake when he rests them on the counter, the glazed look his eyes have, the continuous yawns...everything sticks out.

"Well what do you want then?" I ask, sitting up and turning around, dangling my arms over the back of the couch, trying to sound amicable and friendly.

"I want you to quit trying to be my mother, for one..."

"Roger..." I warn. We've had this fight every night since he quit. He knows I have to do this. He's said it, he knows I've got to watch his every move and breathe down his neck.

"I want you to let me out of the house!" He's starting to whine now, and I know exactly where this conversation is going. How can I avoid this, how can I divert his attention?

"You haven't showered in three days, I'm not letting you out anywhere." I threaten, standing up and grabbing the empty cereal bowl on the coffee table and returning it to the sink. I'm right next to him and I can see how the lack of heroin in his veins is sending his body into little tremors every now and then. He's been really good at hiding those chills, I haven't seen them until now.

"I'm not a child, Mark." He scolds, staring me down. The guy's got some height on me, I'll give him that.

"I know that." My voice is choppy. Too deliberate. And then he says it. The punch line, the kicker, the thing he's been meaning to say since he came out here. 

"I just need one hit and I'll be fine." I do all that I can to keep from turning around and socking him in the jaw.

"Christ, Roger, what do you expect me to say?!" I shout, turning around to face him. "Do you want me to tell you that you can go get high and I won't care? No! You're out of your fucking mind, I'm not letting you out of my sight! You're clean, and you're gonna stay that way..." I'm firm and angry and not backing down. Different. Necessary.

"You don't know what it's like!" He begs me, his huge watery eyes pleading. "You can't understand, I _need_ this!"

"Yeah, well I need sleep. You're right, I don't understand. All I know is that you're staying here and whining isn't going to get you anywhere..." I state, attempting to sound like his desperation doesn't faze me. It does. Very much so. I've never seen Roger so weak. Never heard him beg.

"Why!?" He's louder now. Stronger. Still weak, still small, but stronger than he was before.

"Because I'm not going to let you throw away all you've worked for." I'm still calm. Still trying to be cool and collected. Busying myself with putting away dishes.

"It's _my_ life!" He shouts at me, arms flailing, attempting to get me to respond with more emotion and it's working.

"No, it's not!" I shout back at him, turning from the counter and staring him in the eye again. "It hasn't been your life since you started shooting up! It's been heroin's life! You haven't gotten that life back yet, so why should you get the rights that come with being your own person?! You're not your own person, you're a slave to a fucking _drug_, Roger. And until you prove that you can be your own person, I'm going to treat you like someone who can't walk from one room to the other without observation!" 

Wow. What a rush of adrenaline and relief and concern and explanation.

And then that all ends when Roger's arms swing across the counter and slide everything off of it in one fluid motion. Mugs go crashing to the ground, unpaid bills flutter through the air and fall, pens fly and he lets out this angry anguished cry. Like he's in pain. Christ, he probably _is_ in pain, muscle cramps or something. 

"You can't do this to me!" He bellows, stalking towards me and pinning my shoulders to the wall behind me, my back slamming against it a little harder than I anticipate. "You can't just take something like this away from me! I need this to survive!" He's begging again, and his voice is filled with some emotion that I can't identify because I'm pretty sure I've never seen it in Roger before. I'm admittedly scared. I'm pretty sure if I'm scared, then Roger is petrified.

"No you don't." My shoulders are starting to ache under his hands.

"Yes I DO!" His left hand releases my shoulder and curls into a fist, slamming the wall next to me. I cringe, clenching my teeth, knowing that if I get him angry enough...that fist is coming for my face.

"No, Roger. You don't. You just need to get past the point of feeling like you need it, and then you can go back to being normal again."

He releases me and backs up, eyes shifting neurotically, feet stumbling at an awkward pace as he walks in no particular pattern across the floor. He wrings his hands, runs them through his hair, and I notice how powerfully his whole body is shaking. And sweating. These little whimpers come from his mouth and it's then that I notice the tears. They well in his eyes and spill out without a sound. He's not sobbing, he's just letting them spill over. I take a few steps away from the wall and towards him. Carefully, like I'm approaching a ticking bomb.

"It's going to be fine, Roger, this is the worst it's going to get..." My voice is as soothing as I can make it. I watch as he nods. As his bottom lip shakes, and he tries to hide it. As he gives in finally and lets the sobs come out with the tears. I sit on the couch and he joins me, still sobbing. Still human. I think I needed that reminder. I haven't seen Roger express any other human emotion than need in a long long time. I lean over and put a hand on his shoulder for a second, before he shakes everything off, wipes away the tears and attempts to resume as much normalcy as he can manage.

"I'm tired..." He mutters, his voice deep with having just cried for the first time in ages. I offer him a sympathetic smile.

"I hear you. The movie marathons have been keeping me occupied though." He lets out a little laugh and I'm suddenly relieved.

"Wanna watch Clerks, or something?" I never thought I'd hear Roger ask that question. I've made him sit through that movie more times than I can count. I grin again, adjusting my glasses.

"Sure, if I can find it." I answer, standing and walking to the kitchen. I'm hungry, and I start fixing myself a bowl of Cap'n Crunch.

"Hey..." 

"Yeah?" I continue pouring the cereal into the glass bowl, not looking up.

"Wanna make me a bowl?" 

I nod, smiling. Maybe things are getting better a little faster than I thought.


End file.
